


Diverting from the Mission

by orphan_account



Category: NieR: Automata (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/M, Humans are alive, Semi Canon Typical Setting, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-05-01 06:57:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14514924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: 2B was sent undercover at a school for what felt like the hundredth time to be on the inside of human communities while fighting local threats, partnered up with the increasingly off topic 9S who seemed to be far too keen on getting to know her. Those were all things she could deal with. What she couldn't deal with was the overly friendly boy in her school who seems to know far more about her than is safe.





	1. Arrival

This kind of thing was the same every time she started in a new place. People just couldn’t shake their curiosity sometimes. Humans were so curious in that way; they endlessly investigated things they found intriguing, which was a problem, to say the least, seeing as she was neither human nor did she have nothing to hide. So if she was interesting or approachable, then they just kept poking until they found out what she was doing, which would compromise the whole mission.

“I’m Buddleia,” she said, moderating her tone to make it as boring as she possibly could. Try as she might, people were always interested, but she could do her best to be inconspicuous. She just hadn’t quite decided if she was going to be boring or intimidating this time. Intimidating was probably more interesting.

“Buddleia is new this term,” the teacher explained, as if she hadn’t already said that just a few moments before 2B had introduced herself with the fake name. “Please make her feel welcome.” Honestly, she’d rather people didn’t even try to make her feel welcome. She’d rather they didn’t speak to her at all.

2B went to sit down on the second row from the back. The back was too conspicuous, even though she hated having people behind her staring at her. At least this minimised it. Hopefully from now she would fade into obscurity and none of them would ask her anything at all and she could just get on with her job.

“Hiya, Buddleia,” someone said immediately. 2B tried not to let out an audible sigh. “You have an interesting name. Does it have a meaning? Is it foreign?”

Ah, backstory questions. At least this was something she always had meticulously planned. “It’s a flowering plant,” she said. “It grows here just fine, actually, you just probably haven’t heard of it.”

“Oh, okay then,” the person said. 2B took a moment to process and analyze their tone, but she was pretty sure that they felt slightly offended by her words. Good, because she didn’t want to talk to them. “What does it look like?”

“Uhh.” Why hadn’t she looked this one up? On cue, the mental image of the flower came into the forefront of her database. “Long stalk, lots of flowers in a sort of cone shape. It’s usually purple or white.” Internally, she chastised herself. She really should have thought of that before she walked in here and introduced herself as the name of a flower.

“I know you’re all excited that the order has been disrupted, but eyes front please,” the teacher said, and 2B just about disguised her sigh of relief. Not talking was always something she could get behind. Focusing on information she could find out within an instant on her own didn’t take up too much computing power, but talking to people was a huge chore in comparison. She couldn’t blow her cover when all she was doing was sitting here.

As she’d imagined she would, the lesson held very little that was news to her. At least it wasn’t maths, which she could quite literally do with almost all her systems shut off. Lessons were probably the second worst part of being undercover, after social interaction. She understood that being undercover was necessary because just constantly fighting insurgents did nothing more than instantly get them to take their activities to somewhere else just as at risk, and she was also meant to be able to respond to threats within the school, but it was...well, it was boring. She was a combat model. She wasn’t designed for sitting in geography lessons.

The moment the teacher was done rattling on, people immediately turned their attention to her again. Joy of joys. Why were humans so curious and so incapable of keeping themselves to themselves? They asked her where she was from, if she was staying for long, which school she’d come from, when her birthday was (why did they even want to know that? 2B had to suddenly scramble to remember a realistic year for her birth year before then realising that they didn’t even want to know the year), why her hair was that colour, which subjects she liked, and then her personal favourite: did she have a boyfriend.

“No,” was her immediate response. This was something she’d been told time and time again by an operator that humans were utterly fixated on, and that it was something she needed to be very careful about. Because her internal response that she always had to fight from becoming external was that emotions were prohibited. Humans didn’t say that kind of thing. “I’m also not looking for one. I don’t want anyone to get any ideas.”

There were some soft titters at that. Humans were so obsessed by this idea of women they couldn’t obtain. It was slightly sickening. Young humans were slightly repulsive and she almost loathed protecting them, so she tried to keep her distance. “I bet you actually have a boyfriend already,” one boy said.

“I can assure you I do not,” she said, gathering her empty notepad and pen into her bag. She knew she could leave, it was just that no one was. She wanted to leave, and find somewhere that these people couldn’t bother her.

She walked out of human earshot quickly, knowing that they would start talking about her as soon as she was gone. She shouldn’t be, she knew, but she was always curious about how people reacted to her. She internally justified it as a way to gauge how to act around these people who were supposed to be her peers, and she was going to stick to that argument.

“Wow, she’s cold,” was the first thing that was said, followed by a round of laughs. Ah, human men. How predictable.

“Maybe she’s just shy,” someone else said.

“No way,” the first one said again. “She looked like she was going to stab someone. Weird as fuck.” From there, 2B decided she’d heard enough. She had to find time to contact an operator between lessons, anyway, to report on what she’d been doing, and then she had to go to the next lesson.

As quickly as she could manage to avoid having an encounter with those people who were talking about her when they left the room, she mentally pulled up the map of the school she’d been sent and found her way to the nearest bathrooms, and then she sent a message to command, who called her back immediately. “Unit 2B, this is your regularly scheduled contact,” the operator said, as cheery as always. “How are things?”

‘As expected,’ she sent back, aware that she couldn’t speak in here or someone would hear. ‘Humans are curious about newcomers as always, but I’m working on keeping them from prying too much.’

“Good job,” she said. “First contact with your partner Unit 9S is scheduled for three day’s time. I’ll send you coordinates closer to the date that will be your base of operations.”

‘Appreciated,’ 2B returned. ‘I’ll contact you again with my usual regular check in once I’m done with my next lesson. Unit 2B out.’

“Try to be normal won’t you, 2B?” The operator asked. 2B cut off the line before she could get too much of a lecture, but she made sure to send ‘noted’ back to her operator. 6O tended to get a little hurt when she didn’t get enough positive attention, and it was best to avoid that. It really did ruin their mission efficiency at times when her operator couldn’t stop sniffling.

Trying not to walk with too much grace (that had given her away once; admittedly she had been walking on the edge of a rooftop, not just down a hallway), 2B made her way to the next place she was meant to be. A maths lesson. Joy of endless joys, the most pointless lesson ever for an android to attend. It was an effort to pretend she couldn’t do it all backwards. Oh well. At least it was a chance to mostly turn off and work on examining local maps and all the data she’d been sent. She went for a seat that was fairly central in the room, next to a space where she could make a quick exit if need be, and settled in for boredom.


	2. Meetings (x2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 2B meets a human and then her android partner.

Of course, when she’d sat down, 2B hadn’t anticipated making the mistake of sitting in the space of possibly one of the most annoying humans she had ever encountered. She could practically feel that he was annoying from the moment he walked into the room, because he had a stupid wide grin on his face. What reason did humans have to be happy about attending a subject they barely scratched the surface of with their minds?

Then, of course, he looked up at her, got a strange look in his bright blue eyes, and walked directly over to where she was sitting. “Hi,” he said, smiling even wider, somehow. “I’m Toxates. You’re sitting in my seat but I’ll just go there.” Without complaining at all, he slid into the seat next to her.

“Buddleia,” she said, offering a small smile in return, if only because it was polite. “I’m new.”

“I noticed,” he said, smiling again. “Buddleia’s a nice name. It’s a pretty flower.” He swung a small backpack onto his desk and fished out a notebook and a couple of pens. 2B squinted at what appeared to be...bright ink pens with glitter in them. She wasn’t going to pretend that those didn’t interest her.

“You’d be surprised how few people know it,” she said, slightly hoping that the conversation would lapse into silence. She felt uncomfortable. Conversation really was not her forte, and while she had no explicit mission objectives in this moment, making idle small talk felt like a breach of protocol.

“I know things,” Toxates said. 2B idly wondered what the point of such a redundant statement was, but she didn’t comment on it. “Like how you should probably be ready to start from when the teacher walks in. She’s a bit full on and she goes quickly.”

“Thanks for the heads up,” she said, grabbing her own notebook and the pencil case she’d packed and ordered for today. She had hoped she wouldn’t have to do too much writing, because she hadn’t used her hands for writing in quite some time and she was worried the joints might be a tad stiff, but needs must and all of that.

“You’re not that chatty, are you?” He observed. She shook her head. “Not that that’s a bad thing! Sorry, that had poor implications. It was just an observation. I sort of just say stuff that comes to mind sometimes and my brain to mouth filter is nothing. Just tell me to shut up if I’m too annoying and I’ll probably try.”

2B was tempted to tell him that she preferred the quiet, but something stopped her. Maybe it was that he wasn’t being obtrusive, or maybe it was the cadence of his voice, or something, but she didn’t actually mind. It didn’t feel like she was being judged, and she actually wasn’t too annoyed, even if he was a bit loud and he spoke very quickly.

The lesson started fairly quickly after that, and that in itself flew by. 2B was basically able to tune out, only leaving a few basic sensors on because, as predicted, the lesson was something she could do backwards while powered down. She wasn’t designed specifically for calculations, but her brain was a computer. It was vital to be able to analyse her surroundings, which made basic numbers quite possibly the easiest thing to deal with. It was difficult to understand why humans found it so difficult, but she supposed she didn’t need to understand.

The rest of the day repeated much in the same pattern. Between times when she was obligated to go somewhere, she would contact 6O and give her an update on how everything was running smoothly. People were overall slightly too friendly for her tastes, and people were rather fond of prying a little more than she was comfortable with, but dismissing them was easy. She was just slightly worried that overt hostility would jeopardise her mission objectives.

The next day passed much the same as the first, and by the third, 2B started to notice a trend in the ways the people of the school moved around. She hadn’t had the chance to properly explore, survey, or analyse the data she’d collected, but a few patterns had emerged in levels of activity in the corridors and potential areas she should avoid due to being overly crowded or suspiciously empty.

She’d also discovered that the humans here seemed more inclined to leave her alone when she wasn’t by herself. Which was useful, seeing as the ones who spent all their time asking her for her whole life story had a tendency to avoid her when Toxates was there, and he had seemingly attached himself to her. Every time she was at a meal, forcing human food down, he was there, and when she had extended breaks between lessons, he somehow managed to find her every time.

It was strange, honestly, and very annoying, but almost...endearing. He wasn’t particularly mature and he spoke quickly about plenty of things she didn’t quite recognise, but he wasn’t as annoying as he should have been. She could tune out his words and leave the regular cadence of his voice in the back of her mind as she read. He was happy to talk without her listening apparently, and she was sort of glad that his presence, however annoying he was, kept other people away. It was an arrangement that worked.

At the end of the third day, between lessons and when she was meant to be eating, 2B grabbed her rucksack, which held all her combat and mission gear, and slipped out of the school grounds. She was allowed to leave and wander whenever she liked after hours, as far as she knew (at least, everyone else did, and she hadn’t been told she couldn’t; such a thing wouldn’t stop her, but she would certainly be more stealthy if it was the case), which left her with plenty of time to get work done and make it back in time to claim she’d been going for a morning walk if anyone stopped her.

She crossed the river and went into the city proper. She’d only seen it once, when she’d been flown in, and it was different from the ground. There were more people, and she was constantly on edge. There were people here she may be attempting to apprehend within a few hours. She had a base point where she would be meeting 9S, the scanner she’d been assigned, which she entered after checking that no one was watching the point. She knew that surveillance and cameras was all sorted out in advance, and no one who didn’t need to see the footage of this building would be unable to, but it didn’t hurt to check. No one was around who was actually paying attention to what was seemingly a normal girl entering an office block.

Quickly, she pulled off the uniform she’d been wearing while in lessons and tugged on something more suited to combat before stuffing her other clothes into the bag. Come to think of it, she should have brought something to walk back in, as her combat partner wasn’t meant to know where she was undercover in case it jeopardised either of them, whether through the possibility of leaked information or capture.

Then, she strapped her weapons onto her back once more, and she was ready to head off. They probably wouldn’t leave immediately on 9S’ arrival, but it didn’t hurt to be prepared. And last of all, she pulled her visor from the bag, tied it around the back of her head, and shoved the bag into a cupboard. That was better. She felt more herself now she didn’t have to hide behind a human facade.

She had been early, so she didn’t have to wait long until the door rattled twice before opening. Her scanner had turned the door handle the wrong way. Ah. She stayed sat in a separate room for a short while, listening to 9S rattle around the room, presumably also getting ready. Once he fell silent, she left the room.

“9S,” she said. Immediately, his relaxed form tensed. “I’m 2B. I’m to be your combat unit to support you in your endeavours.”

“Oh, right!” He rubbed the back of his neck in an awkward gesture 2B couldn’t quite interpret. “You know already, but I’m 9S. I’ve been here for a while at this point, I know a lot about what’s going on in this city. Safe to say, I think I’ll need your help with combat quite a lot.”

“Well,” 2B said, making a move to contact 6O to let her know she’d met up with him, “let’s begin, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, the response to the previous chapter just blew me away :) thank you so much, everyone.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you a bunch for reading :) comments are appreciated if you have any thoughts, especially as I don't have the best handle on the lore of the game so I might get some stuff wrong. I'm very open to constructive criticism!


End file.
